


Foiled Again!

by smoothmovebro



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Love/Hate, M/M, Pranks and Practical Jokes, and rich hates it but loves him for it, creative ways to foil said pranks and practical jokes, michael is a really chill guy, teasing as a way of courtship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-10
Updated: 2017-11-10
Packaged: 2019-01-31 12:36:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12682029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smoothmovebro/pseuds/smoothmovebro
Summary: Michael Mell is a really chill guy. He takes things in stride and he knows how to laugh at himself.Rich Goranski does all sorts of things to get a reaction from Michael but gets nothing from the guy.Rich doesn't know if he loves or hates that about Michael.





	Foiled Again!

**Author's Note:**

> written for nanowrimo 2017  
>  ~~sorry for the delay!~~

Having a pill in your head that tells you what to do fosters some habits. Those habits tend to be difficult to overcome, especially if they involve you resorting to teasing whenever you find yourself feeling any emotion that vaguely resembles love.

Rich Goranski tries his best to become better since the SQUIP deactivated in his head that day. The lack of a voice in his head makes him feel empty some days but relieved in others. Day by day, he gains confidence in his own charm and personality while still keeping the friends he made while he had the SQUIP.

Post-SQUIP, he’s starting to form new relationships with people he vaguely knew at school. The anti-social headphones kid, Michael Mell, is one of them. Rich only ever knew Michael because he was practically an extension of Jeremy. You couldn’t have one without the other. Therefore, much of the days that were spent tormenting Jeremy were also spent tormenting Michael to some extent.

Today is a foul day for Rich’s welfare. Another fight with his dad in the morning makes him come to school in a disgruntled mood. He knows it’s a destructive coping mechanism but damn, did he want to pick on someone today.

He’s walking down the hallway and he sees a familiar blue and white backpack. The ‘riends’ that he scrawled on it some months ago is starting to fade. He grins and procures a Sharpie from his bag. He creeps up to Michael.

Rich yanks Michael by the backpack and says, “Hey, headphones!” Michael turns around and swivels his head left and right before peering down at Rich, making Rich feel even more irritated.

“Time to freshen up the ink on ur bag,” Rich sneers. He shoves Michael against the nearest set of lockers and scrawls over the fading ‘riends’, making it bigger and more noticeable. He lets Michael go and walks away laughing. Deep down, he doesn’t really know why he had to be such a jerk about it.

What perplexes him further, though, is Michael shrugging off his backpack to inspect it. After a few furtive glances, Rich sees that Michael peered at the backpack, made an approving expression, then wore it again and walked to class with… a spring in his step?

The guy is _okay_ with this?! Rich huffs and walks to class, feeling more confused than angry with himself.

The next day, at lunch, Rich almost spits out his drink when he sees Michael walk into the cafeteria.

He’s wearing the backpack he scrawled ‘riends’ on, but there’s something different about it.

_Michael embroidered over his writing._

Now it looks like some tacky streetwear brand logo stitched on his backpack. It was a different color for each letter, making the logo resemble the colors of the rainbow. Rich stares at the stitching and the contrast of the threads against the backpack.

He stalks over to Michael’s table, where Jeremy is also sitting. “Hey, tallasses!” he greets. The other boys look at Rich. He grabs Michael’s bag and holds it up.

“What the fuck is this?” he says.

Michael puts down the sandwich he’s eating and begins to explain. “See, I actually kinda liked the new design you did, so I thought I’d stitch over it. You know, make it more permanent.” He points at Jeremy’s backpack. “I even did the same for Jeremy’s so that we’d match. I think the threads really work well with our bags.”

Rich puts down Michael’s bag and inspects Jeremy’s. Indeed, his writing has been embroidered over with the same color scheme as the one on Michael’s. He looks at Michael in disbelief.

“You actually have real nice handwriting, dude,” Michael says. “Maybe you should take up calligraphy.”

Rich gulps at the compliment. He searches for a prompt from his SQUIP but curses himself for falling back into his freshman tendencies of bashfulness and awkwardness. Finally, he resorts to what he knows best: insults.

“Well, have fun looking gay as shit, _tallasses_ ,” he says while walking away. He touches his cheek to make sure he wasn’t blushing just then.

Michael, complimenting him for his handwriting. Michael, with that easy grin and swooping hair. Michael, a guy that Rich thought he’d never be into.

And yet…

* * *

One incident doesn’t mean anything, right? That’s just once, it surely can’t happen again.

Sike, in Rich’s case.

After the backpack incident, Rich has taken to embarrassing Michael to get his attention. He’s never put so much effort into humiliating someone since Jeremy, and even then that was with the help of the SQUIP.

It was the end of a class they shared and they had just finished a group activity. Rich made sure that he ended up in the same group as Michael to improve his chances of pulling off his plan. As they walk out of the classroom, Rich takes out a piece of paper with something he wrote beforehand and sticks a piece of tape on the top side. He jogs up to Michael and starts talking to him about what happened in class.

“Man, I never would’ve guessed that part in the cloze passage. I thought we weren’t meant to repeat words!” Rich says, sidling up to Michael. Michael laughs and it makes Rich’s heart flutter.

“Yeah, process of elimination, you know. Even though we already crossed out that word, there really isn’t any other that fit the sentence better,” Michael says.

Rich nods and he claps his hand on Michael’s back. He makes sure the tape sticks to Michael’s hoodie and glances behind him to double check.  “Thanks for saving our asses back there,” he says. “Really appreciate it.”

Michael scoffs and waves a dismissive hand. “It’s just one class.”

Rich lets himself lag behind, making it look like he’s heading the other direction. “I’ll see you around.”

As Michael walks away, Rich snickers to himself at the note he put on Michael’s back. _Kick me_ , it says _._

It’s an immature move to pull, yes, but he has to admit it’s a hilarious and classic move.

His bright mood changes when someone down the hallway taps at Michael’s shoulder and informs him of the note on his back. Michael reaches from behind him to look at the note. He takes a pen from his pocket and starts to write on Rich’s note. Rich stays near the walls to witness the next events unfold.

Michael puts the note on his back again and continues walking, this time with a spring in his step. Rich chokes on air after reading what Michael added to his note.

It reads: _Kick me, because this ass bounce._

Rich couldn’t help but check out Michael’s ass as the other boy walks away. He blushes when he admits to himself that indeed, Michael’s ass _does_ bounce. Whether it’s because of the flattering jeans he’s wearing today or the way he carries himself, Michael’s gifted with an excellent behind.

Rich retreats to the nearest set of lockers when he sees Michael look back and wink at him.

Something’s starting to happen here, but Rich isn’t sure if he’s ready to admit that to himself.

* * *

It’s become a game to him now. What could he do that will make Michael lose his cool and eventually feel embarrassed?

This new plan is a bold one, involving stealth and speed.

It’s after PE class and all the boys are in the shower room. Rich makes sure he gets showered and changed quicker than everyone else so he can hang around and chat with other boys.

He sees Michael walk into the shower room and set down his things so he could go into a shower stall. Rich would be lying if he said he wasn’t checking out Michael taking off his clothes. The boy wasn’t physically fit, but he had a toned chest and a cute little pudge on his stomach. His thighs are thick and supple-looking. He sneaks one more glance and stares in awe at the curve of Michael’s back and how the towel hugs at his hips. Rich has to physically look away before he feels that familiar tenting in his pants that happened to him way too often back in freshman year.

Now with Michael showering in the stall, Rich sneaks over to the bench where Michael set down his things. He looks to the other boys and puts a finger to his lips before taking everything but Michael’s glasses. The other boys stifle snickers and chuckles before resuming their business.

Rich hides Michael’s clothes in his locker and waits. He busies himself by taking his time packing away his dirty clothes. He sees Michael emerge from the shower stall.

With the steam still swirling around him, the water droplets sliding down his chest, his hair slicked back and his eyes narrowed from not being able to see, Michael looks divine to Rich. He’s starting to feel less and less remorse for taking Michael’s clothes if that means getting to look at him shirtless and wet for longer.

Michael walks over to the bench and reaches for his glasses. Once he puts them on, his eyes widen and he searches for his clothes. A few boys notice this and start to laugh. Michael blushes and he retraces his steps, searching for his things. After searching through most of the shower room, Michael looks around the room one last time. He sighs and he stretches his neck.

Michael brings up his hands to either side of his neck and flicks his wrists, as if popping up an imaginary collar. He hums a descending riff, then slides across a small section of the locker room. The other boys stop to watch his ridiculous performance.

“Just take those old records off the shelf!” Michael sings. He has one hand clutching his shampoo bottle like it’s a microphone. “I sit and listen to them by myself!”

Rich hides a smile behind his hand at the cheesy reference to that scene in [‘Risky Business’](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2UVsyVLLcE). He lets Michael re-enact the scene just before it got to the part where he’ll have to get on his knees and imitate a sick air guitar solo.

“Stop acting weird, tallass,” he says. “Your clothes are right here.” He tosses Michael his clothes and the other boy catches them with ease. He winks his thank you at Rich.

The boy beside Rich nudges at his side. “I think the headphones kid has a thing for you,” he says.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Rich retorts. He storms off the shower room, feeling stifled by both its literal and figurative stuffiness.

* * *

Rich sees the connection in his last two encounters with Michael: the punch isn’t upfront. The delivery of the embarrassment is delayed, giving Michael time to get creative and foil his plans.

This time, Rich comes up with something that puts Michael on the spot. He fluffs up the last of his fake bouquet for Michael and takes it with him to school, making sure that the end of the bouquet slots discreetly into his flannel sleeve, where he has a pouch of water he can squeeze.

Rich comes up to Michael at his locker and brings out the bouquet in front of him. “I’m sorry for being an asshole to you,” he says. It gets Michael’s attention and the other boy turns to him and brings his headphones down to hang around his neck.

“You… brought me flowers,” Michael states. Rich holds out a hand to give them to him. The corner of his mouth curls up when he sees a straw connecting from the bouquet to Rich’s flannel. He knows full well what Rich is up to but he leans in anyway to ‘smell’ the flowers.

Rich squeezes the pouch of water in his pocket and the water sprays at Michael in the face. Rich doubles over, laughing at Michael’s reaction. As his laughter dies down, he sees that Michael has foiled him once again.

The bastard took that as an opportunity to shake his head to get the water off him. Some of the water got to his hair so he runs a hand through it, slicking it back. Rich gulps and he grips the bouquet in his hands.

“Good one, Rich,” Michael says with a laugh. “I kinda needed that to freshen up. This is actually one of your sweeter ones.”

His lisp emerges when he speaks. “S-screw you, tallass!” Rich turns to walk away but Michael grabs at his shoulder, making Rich face him.

It all comes flooding now with Rich feeling confronted. “Look, you’re a chill guy and I’m kinda jealous of that. How you’re just so _relaxed_ and everything and I wanted to do _something_ that’ll drive you up the wall… Or something like that…”

Michael’s face turns sincere. “You really wanna know what’s driving me up the wall?”

Rich’s face brightens up and he nods vigorously.

“The fact that we haven’t gone on a date yet.”

Rich feels the bouquet slip from his hands but Michael catches it and offers it to Rich. “Menlo Park Mall this afternoon?”

Speechless, Rich nods. He finds himself getting too excited, though, when he accidentally squeezes the water pouch in his pocket and ends up spraying himself. Michael laughs and takes off his hoodie to let Rich dry himself off. When Rich starts to give back Michael’s hoodie, the other boy shakes his head. “Isn’t that what boyfriends do? Share clothes?”

Rich takes off his flannel and wears Michael’s hoodie. It falls too loose on the shoulders, making the sleeves too long on him and the hem fall nearly halfway down his thighs. Michael’s heart melts at the image before him.

Michael leans down to give Rich a peck on the cheek. “See you then.”

**Author's Note:**

> tl;dr: this fic was the bmc version of [this post](https://imasaphaeltrash.tumblr.com/post/147205697680/raphael-i-have-to-kill-him-magnus-raphael).


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